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Girl 99 by Andy Jones blogtour and book extract

Girl 99 written by Andy Jones, publisher Lake Union Publishing, is available in ebook, paperback and audio download format from 14th February 2017.

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Product Details (as per amazon page)

When Tom’s girlfriend walks out on him the day before Christmas, he feels humiliated but not necessarily heartbroken. Sadie wasn’t, after all, The One. If we’re being precise, she was number eighty-five.

And so, for reasons that are only mostly wrong, Tom embarks on a mission to bring his number of encounters up to a nice neat one hundred.

Over the course of his quest he sleeps with a colleague, a colleague of a friend, a friend of a friend, a friend of a friend’s wife, the estate agent selling his flat and several more besides.

Everything is going, if not well, then at least according to plan…and then Tom meets Verity. Whether she’s The One remains to be seen, but she’s certainly more than just another number.

Revised edition: This edition of Girl 99 includes editorial revisions.

I am so pleased to be involved in the blogtour promoting and celebrating the launch of the revised edition of Andy Jones novel Girl 99. Andy Jones has kindly allowed me to share an extract from his novel. All the hosts on the tour will be sharing a different extract. My extract is titled ‘The Bet’. This extract sets up Tom’s whole ill-fated mission – his friend in this scene, El, is suffering from Huntington’s disease, which goes some way to explaining Tom’s rather eccentric behaviour.

‘Eighty-five,’ El says, using his fork to trace the digits into his oyster sauce. ‘That’s almost a hundred.’

‘Did Phil cook Christmas dinner?’ I ask, sensing where this is going and not liking the look of the neighbourhood.

El shrugs, points his fork at me. ‘You should go for your century.’

‘Turkey and all the trimmings?’

‘Say you’re playing snooker or cricket,’ El continues. ‘And you rack up a score of eighty-five. You don’t quit. You get your head down and get on with it.’

‘Fine,’ I say. ‘I’ll do it. I’ll put an ad in the paper.’

‘Don’t be facetious; I’m only trying to help.’

I take a long sip of my Tsingtao.

‘Do you know how many people I’ve slept with?’ El asks.

I sip more beer and shrug.

‘Guess.’

‘I don’t know. Ten? Twenty?’

‘Guess again.’

‘A hundred,’ I say.

‘Do I look like a slut?’

I give El the finger.

He holds up four in return. ‘Three men and’ – he shudders – ‘one woman.’

‘I think that’s sweet,’ I say.

‘It’s pathetic. So, if not for yourself, do it for me. Think of it as having my share.’

‘Christ, El, you’re like a . . . like a dog with a bone.’

‘Very apt.’

And this is how it goes for the next thirty-several minutes. I try, numerous times, to change topic, but El’s train of thought is locomotive and will not be derailed.